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Are you looking to get into Foiling?

F-ONE Says:

This Freeride foil built of aluminium and carbon is super accessible to enjoy all the sensations of foiling whatever your level. Using a specific aluminum extruded profile and a medium chord length of 11cm, its lightweight makes the foil easy to carry and move around both on shore and in the water. The performance enabled by its 1.5 cm thick, low-drag section ensures this mast will take some time to outgrow. Equipped with the patented Fast Connection Device constructed from Pre-preg carbon, this mast comes with great modularity and ease of use as one single screw is all that’s needed to assemble the main parts together. Compatible with all F-One wings and foil parts, it is also completely watertight and corrosion free. For kitefoiling, this mast is recommended with the Freeride 800 and Freeride 600 wings to get the most enjoyable ride. Easily fitted to an F-One Foilboard thanks to the all conical KF-Box, this mast offers great potential to enjoy the thrills of foiling.

TKB Says:

When it comes to foilboard testing, if there is one thing that we’ve learned it is that no two foilboards are alike. With the addition of multiple wingsets and an aluminum mast option, this holds true for the second generation of foil products from F-One. We tested the Freeride 800 wing with the new aluminum mast and were superbly impressed with how F-one integrated metal into their carbon construction to deliver a very solid and crisp ride with little to no vibration or metalic hums that you might expect to experience when substituting a lower cost material with carbon.

We tested the Freeride 800 Hybrid and found that this wingset foils up a little slower (yep, that’s a good thing) than their previous freeride model. This made us a huge fan of the new direction that F-One is taking foilboarding (reading between the lines — we can’t wait until we get our hands on the Freeride 1000). Generally speaking, this wingset (800) still ranks high in the stability category relative to what is out there, and as we have noted before, F-One foils tend to be slightly more stable on the yaw-axis in particular compared to the other freeride foils out there. We like the foil for all around freeride and can’t help think that a foil that is both super stable and planes up at a slower speed is more helpful for those who are learning.

Starting out slower with a less reactive wing tends to reduce those huge radical crashes you often see beginners take. The flipside is that it takes bigger inputs to be aggressive, but that confidence in foiling only comes with time.

Its weight is fairly good considering that the strut is metal. The whole setup feels really stiff with your inputs going directly into the foil for a crisp feel. As we hinted at earlier, some metal struts have vibration from the metallic construction but the F-One mast was super smooth and silent, which may or may not have to do with how finely tuned the forward and aft wings are when working together to create lift.

While riding, we found that our back foot wanted to be right behind the mast bolt for optimal stance so we tended to want to be farther forward on the foil to equal out our foot pressure between the front foot and back foot, but stance and technique will probably vary widely between foilboarders — you’ll have to tell us what you think. Despite the lower aspect, this foil was still fairly efficient with a solid top speed, perhaps not up to snuff for the course racers out there, but we are of the opinion that freeriding should be about going slow and laying down sick carves.

To mount the mast to the board, the Freeride 800 foil uses what they call a KF Box which is basically a tuttle-like box with two bolts on top.

We’ve always been more enamored with 4-bolt plate bindings as they guarantee a solid connection, but this system that F-One uses was very much welcomed, much easier to assemble and while riding, there was absolutely no play in that junction. The wing uses a single bolt to hold the forward and aft wings onto the fuselage, a very simple and streamlined design that seems to be working very well for F-One

We ran the Freeride 800 on the Mitu pro model surfboard and it was a great combination. However, when you mate a foil with a surfboard you don’t get the benefit of the chined rail that is more user-friendly when the rail hits the water, so if you want that definitely go with one of F-One’s dedicated foilboards. We really liked the Mitu option because we just left the surf fins in and when the wind came up we were able to unplug the foil and take advantage of some really fun kitesurfing conditions. If you were traveling, this would be the tool combination to let you do it all.

In summation, F-One has been making some exceptional production foils with incredible attention to detail with impeccable fit and finish. The Freeride 800 is a great entry into the Freeride category with slower foilup speeds and a overall ride that we found to be really fun for freeride carving.

The metal mast option is extremely well executed and delivers a very solid feel making this a really great option for the aspiring learner who wants a foil that will serve them well into their intermediate and advanced freeride ambitions.

Soulkite

Soulkite is a kitesurfing school based in Fremantle near Perth, Western Australia. According to the wind direction, we give kitesurfing lessons in these locations : Point Walter and Applecrosson the Swan river.

We offer kitesurfing and stand up paddle board lessons near Perth for beginner, intermediate and advanced riders.